


A Risk Worth Taking

by joannakth



Series: The Stony!Verse [3]
Category: Marvel (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, M/M, Science Bros, Weddings, random references to x-men even though they're not in MCU, whoops
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-06
Updated: 2015-05-06
Packaged: 2018-03-29 06:37:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3886099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/joannakth/pseuds/joannakth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I’m sure she knows you love her but,” He pauses. “But it’s been nearly four years Bruce. If you guys continue the way you are, I just – I just can’t help but think that one day five, maybe six years from now, she’s going to wake up and realize that she’s spent nearly ten years with someone who hates himself so much he doesn’t care if he lives or dies.”</p>
<p>Where Tony and Bruce have a talk about fear, love, and taking leaps of faith on the morning of Steve and Tony's wedding.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Risk Worth Taking

**Author's Note:**

> So I originally wrote this story a few years ago after I saw the first Avengers movie, so I'm sorry that none of the amazing characters that have been introduced since then make an appearance! But, that's how long my friend and I have been playing in this universe. This story is a timestamp from Fire in my Veins and Joy in my Soul, set right before Steve and Tony's wedding. There are quite a few stories in this universe laying around on my computer that I haven't published here because I feel like they're more about our OFC, Betty Schaer, than the canon Avengers. However, I've been thinking about this series a lot lately after AOU, especially after the whole Bruce/Nat aspect of AOU, and I decided to post this story. I chose this one in particular because it's really about Bruce as a character and Tony and Bruce's friendship. I hope you guys enjoy it!

Bruce had never liked the heat. Not even after years spent going through Calcutta’s disgustingly humid summer weather. He has no tolerance for it and he honestly doesn’t understand why anyone would ever want a summer wedding. Even worse, an outdoor summer wedding. But it’s not his wedding, so he guesses it doesn’t really matter what he thinks.

He’s sitting quietly in the corner, watching the groom share witty banter with the best man and contemplating whether chugging another bottle of water is a wise decision. It’s been a really quiet day and honestly he’s shocked because everyone had been betting on this being a disaster.

“Just can’t take your eyes off me, can you Rhodes?” Tony asks, teasing the colonel after catching him gazing in his direction again. “I completely understand, but you’re out of luck.”

Rhodey just rolls his eyes and responds dryly, “Good to know your last minute jitters aren’t interfering with your ego.”

“Honestly,” Tony says, ignoring Rhodey completely. “You had your chance in college.”

“As shocking as it might seem, I’m not actually ogling you. It’s more of a gaze of disbelief that you’re actually here, getting dressed in a tent, and oh, getting married to Captain America. Sad thing is, the Captain America part of this scenario is the least surprising part.”

Bruce tunes them out after that. Not for lack of interest, or lack of amusement but because he just feels out of place. Or maybe because he’s sweating like a pig in his tux. The tent’s a goddamn heat trap. He scoops his phone out of his jacket pocket and looks down at the new text he finds there with a smile.

_What is the proper reaction to an x-man hitting on you?_

Such a simple joke and he’s pretty sure he’s grinning like a loon. They’ve been together for a decent chunk of time now. Steve and Tony only got together five months before they did and here he is at their wedding. It’s been long enough that her joke doesn’t send him spiraling into a tizzy of ‘She’s going to run off with a mutant’ and he’s actually pretty proud of that. He hits reply, grin going even wider as snippets of Rhodey’s rant seep through his subconscious as he types.He hears things like, “You’re the same man that dedicated his junior year to hooking up with every single member of Delta Sigma Theta.” And, “For your first three months as head of Stark Industries you wore nothing but that stupid t-shirt that said Make Love AND War.”

_Ignore them. That’s what Tony does when they try to order him around in battle. It’s kind of the same situation._

He clicks send and immediately tries to scrub Tony’s response to Rhodey from his brain as it involved a detail about Cap’s genitalia that he never, ever wanted to know. Luckily he doesn’t have to think about it for too long, as she responds almost immediately.

_I tried that and it didn’t work, so I casually mentioned who my boyfriend was and he laid off. Apparently Mr. LeBeau has a healthy fear of handsome molecular thermonuclear astrophysicists. But now I’m back to chair guarding alone. Will you be out soon?_

The warm bubbly feeling that had been building up in his stomach leaves him in one big rush as he reads the words. And while he may be advanced enough to know that she won’t leave him for a mutant, he’s not advanced enough about this. He types up his automatic response and hits send before he even registers when he wrote. You know it’s not the physicist he’s afraid of. It’s short and clipped and he wants to take it back as soon as he sends it. Because he knows, he knows, that’s not what she meant but every time she brings it up it feels like a punch to the heart and all the time and effort she’s put in to letting him know that she doesn’t care is clouded out by guilt and resentment and why is she wasting her time with me?

_I’m sorry_ , he types. _I’ll be out soon. I promise_.

And he sighs and slips his phone back into his pocket because it’s the best he can do for her right now. He looks up just in time to see Clint rush through the flap of the tent.

“Hey, hey,” Tony says at his arrival. “Aren’t you supposed to be firmly Camp Rogers?”

And as ridiculous as it sounds, it’s how Tony’s been referring to the division of groomsmen since they began planning this whole thing so it’s not surprising. Rhodey and Bruce had been ‘Camp Stark’ and Clint and Thor had been ‘Camp Rogers.’ He hadn’t really minded the spilt, though he knew Tony must have found his quiet bachelor party disappointing, even if he was being surprisingly not-whiny about it. Steve was being very quiet about his own. Knowing Clint and Thor, it probably involved eating ridiculous amounts of food, a lot of nudity, and a ton of other unmentionable things.

“I am,” he says, voice jokingly defensive. “But the boss lady’s called for Rhodes.”

The boss lady being Pepper, of course.

“What does she need me for?” Rhodey asks, even as he moves towards him to follow him out. They walk away talking about something regarding speeches, leaving Bruce alone with Tony, who’s only fidgeting a little bit, and the damp horrible heat.

“How are you not dying?” Bruce pants.

“Eh, you get used to heat after certain amount of time behind a blow torch,” he says lightly, walking to take the seat next to Bruce. “And the three months in Afghanistan helped too.”

Bruce lets out a light, breathy chuckle and leans back to take in his friend. He bears no outward signs of panic, which isn’t odd. Tony is unusually good under pressure. But Bruce has managed to learn his tells over the years. He’s learned how to read him and he knows the look he gets in his eyes when he’s panicked. There’s no sign of it now.

“You’re really not nervous at all, are you?” Bruce asks voice quiet and slightly awed.

“Ah, no,” Tony says lightly, with just an edge of confusion before a shit-eating grin blooms across his face. “I’m always at my most charming in front of a crowd.”

“I know you wouldn’t be nervous about the ceremony. I’d think you’d be nervous about marriage,” Bruce explains. “I mean, this is it.”

Tony just shrugs, sarcasm slipping away and leaving him with a rare genuine grin. “I mean, we’ve been together for four years now. Considering how often we risk our necks, that’s practically a lifetime. And he’s just it. I’ve just never felt-” he cuts himself off with a laugh. “To quote a classic, I liked it so I put a ring on it.”

Bruce opens his mouth to say something in return, to even laugh, but he comes up blank. They’re in love. There’s really nothing more to add to it. And suddenly he’s practically itching to go find Betty and to kiss the living daylights out of her.

He stopped by Tony’s voice asking, “How about you?”

“How about I what?” he asks in return, wondering if he missed an important part of the conversation while he was off daydreaming.

“When’s it going to be my turn to be part of Camp Banner?” he asks with a grin.

“I’m looking forward to getting back at you for my bachelor party. Expect prostitutes. Lots and lots of filthy prostitutes.”

As horrible as the last part of Tony’s sentence is, Bruce’s mind kind of derails after the first question. Him? Get Married? No, no he can’t. Being together and going out together and sleeping over at each other’s apartments and knowing each other inside and out and loving – that’s one thing. Marriage is completely different. Bruce just looks away with a little chuckle at the absurdity of the thought. “You’re going to be waiting an awfully long time.”

“Hey,” Tony says, slapping him on the shoulder in an attempt to regain his full attention. “If I can get someone to agree the marry me, I mean me. Note – all of those stories Rhodey told? 100% true. So if I can get someone to marry me, you can definitely get someone to marry you.”

Bruce looks down at his watch before replying, “There’s still time left for him change his mind.”

It’s an obvious attempt to bait him and Tony doesn’t take it. “Stop trying to change the subject,” he says. “What? Do you just not want to get married?”

Bruce sighs, resigned to the fact that there’s no way out of this. “It’s not that I don’t want-” he stops to take a deep breath. “Who would want to marry me?”

“Oh I don’t know,” Tony says, feigning deep thought. “Maybe the girl you’ve been dating for over three and a half years?”

“And it took half of those three and a half years before I could even bring myself to admit that I was in love with her. And that only happened after I nearly killed her!”

He feels weary as his head falls into his hands. “I’m not husband material. I don’t even know why she’s still here, why she even likes me. I don’t even like me most days.”

Tony sighs, a deep heavy sound that usually indicates that he really wants a drink. “Bruce, I-”

“Tony don’t-” because they’ve had this conversation before. Many times before. And in the end it doesn’t even matter.

“No!” Tony yells, tugging on his shoulder to get his attention back on him yet again. “Bruce. You deserve this. You deserve her. You love each other, anyone can see that. You’ve been together three and a half fucking years!”

“I just-” And he knows it isn’t worth arguing because he knows Tony can bullshit circles around him, so he gives in. “It’s marriage. I don’t know what’s been keeping her around this long; let alone what would keep her around for the rest of our lives.”

“Maybe because she _loves_ you?”

“You said that already,” Bruce snaps.

“Yeah, and I’ll keep saying it until it gets through your thick skull,” Tony fires back without pause. “Look, I know that I’m not exactly the poster child for listening to people but at least I can recognize a good thing when I see it. You can’t seem to, so let me help you out. Betty’s good for you. And despite what you seem to think, you’re pretty good for her too if for no other reason than that she loves you. And I’m sure she knows you love her but-” He stops, cutting himself off, and Bruce knows that whatever he has to say must be terrible because Tony Stark has never tip-toed around him.

“But what?” he practically yells.

“Bruce, you need to calm down.”

“No, I don’t need to calm down.”

And it’s funny because as upset as he is, it’s clouded out by an overwhelming morbid curiosity to hear what Tony has to say. What words will seal his doom.

Suddenly, he doesn’t even notice the heat.

“I need to know what you were going to say.”

Tony takes a deep breath, narrowing his eyes as if that’ all he needs to help decipher whether Bruce is only seconds away from Hulking out. Apparently he finds what he needs because he continues. “I’m sure she knows you love her but,” He pauses. “But it’s been nearly four years Bruce. If you guys continue the way you are, I just – I just can’t help but think that one day five, maybe six years from now, she’s going to wake up and realize that she’s spent nearly ten years with someone who hates himself so much he doesn’t care if he lives or dies.”

It hits him like a punch to the gut and his knee-jerk reaction to lash out. To attack him. To yell and scream and point out that he is hardly the person to lecture him on self-loathing. But he takes a deep breath and calms himself. Because the last thing he needs right now is to Hulk out and ruin Tony and Steve’s wedding, despite how pissed he is.

“How would you know?” he settles on.

Tony lets out a flat little chuckle. “Pepper,” he looks down and it’s the closest Bruce has ever seen him to looking ashamed. “Pepper could write you an essay on it. But from what I gather, loving someone who doesn’t love themselves enough to want to stick around isn’t exactly a picnic.”

Bruce swallows, his throat dry, trying to swallow down heaps upon heaps of pent up guilt and resentment and memories of her little frowns and sighs and tears she didn’t think he saw. “I know,” he says in return. “But how do you do it? How do you make it stop?”

“Ah, that’s the trick,” Tony mutters, with a wry little smile. “It’s not about making it stop. It’s about loving them more than you hate yourself. If you can do that none of the other crap’ll matter anymore because they fact that they see something in you, that they love you for you despite of all the crap you’ve done – that’ll be enough.”

Bruce opens his mouth to say something in response, anything, but he can’t form words. His head is spinning and he’s not exactly sure what all this means. And then Rhodey and Clint come back and start saying that it’s time to get this show on the road so there’s no time to even contemplate it further for now.

Tony pats him on the shoulder once and shoots him a look as he gets up. It’s the only acknowledgement that this even happened. Soon enough he’s got a huge smile on his face and he’s talking about getting hitched and they’re walking down the aisle and as hot as it is even Bruce can’t deny that everything is beautiful.

The actual ceremony is on raised platform which holds the grooms and the entire wedding party. Bruce can see all of the guests from here but he’s really only looking for one. She’s sitting in the front row, wedged in between Pepper and Nick Fury, a scenario that is only made even more hilarious by the fact that Fury’s wearing his usual black coat over his suit. When she catches his gaze he expects her to frown or look away but she surprises him yet again. She shoots a wide grin and a wink, as if he hadn’t just snapped at her via text and then not come out like he said he would, and he thinks that maybe Tony’s advice might not be as hard to follow as he thought it would be.

 

 

…

 

The reception, thank goodness, is indoors. It’s in a very pretty, very large, very air conditioned reception hall about ten minutes away from the tower. Tony had told him why he had insisted on a venue within walking distance a while ago, but Bruce blocked it out as soon as the words came out of his mouth.

And it’s lovely, maybe even lovelier than the actual ceremony had been. Well, maybe Bruce was being influenced by the AC, but Pepper had really pulled out all the stops. The entire hall was covered in cream and gold, with tiny red accents here and there just for Tony. The hall was huge, giving people room to spread out, and had French doors that lead out onto balconies on one side. The food had been insanely good and the bar insanely busy but even busier was the huge square dance floor in the center of the room.

During a seemingly random burst of affection during the wedding planning Tony had asked Pepper to switch out the DJ for a band. And not just any band. Their platform takes up half of the entire hall. Bruce thinks it’s the biggest band he’s ever seen. They’re performing a lively swing number and the floor’s packed. He can see Betty from where he’s sitting and he can’t help a smile from spreading across his face.

She’s dancing with Steve and neither one of them can really dance at all, let alone swing dance. They look ridiculous as they try to spin and twirl to the beat but he hasn’t seen either one of them stop laughing since this song started so it doesn’t really matter.

He sets his drink down and looks down at his feet to check that her shoes are still where she left them by her chair and sighs a little sigh of relief when he finds them there. It’s a little ridiculous as shoes don’t just up and walk away, but he knows that she’s particularly fond of them and would frown that little frown that causes a crease between her brows if they were lost. But they’re there and he’s only questioning his sanity a little bit when he looks back up to see her stocking feet slip and slide across the dance floor.

Steve always catches her before she manages to fall though, picking her up and spinning her around again like it’s nothing. Bruce remembers when he used to be so jealous. But as he looks at the two of them he can’t help but think back to all the family pictures and videos he’s seen of her and her brother dancing together. It tugs on his heart strings to see the same expression she wears in those photos reflected on her face now. But most of all she’s having fun, which always manages to put a smile on Bruce’s face.

She hasn’t mentioned his earlier misstep at all, not being anything but her normal happy, peppy self all day. And he can’t help but remember Tony’s words. Because he loves hers, God he loves her, and maybe one day-

The song ends, fading into a much slower, softer sound. The two part with a kiss to the cheek as Tony materializes next to Steve in that way only Tony can pull off, whispering in his new husband’s ear and pulling him close. Soon they’re swaying to the music and even though Betty’s been thoroughly ditched, she still beams at them like they’re possibly the best thing in the entire world. But then she turns to Bruce, looking straight at him because of course she’s always known exactly where he is. And he nearly loses his breath when her smile softens and her expression tells him that she thinks he’s _definitely_ the best thing in the world.

She stretches out a hand in a silent request to join her and as much as he hates dancing in a big crowd like this, he can’t bring himself to deny her. He shuffles out onto the dance floor and takes her into his arms without a word. And it’s so easy. It’s so easy to imagine a happily ever after when they’re gentling swaying on the dance floor and she’s smiling into his neck.

“Hey Bets,” he whispers into her ear, his mouth suddenly dry. “You ever think about, you know…” he trails off for a moment, searching for words. “You ever think about us doing something like this one day?”

She stiffens in his arms before she answers and he nearly backpedals because there’s a voice screaming in his head that he shouldn’t do this; that she deserves so much more. But she relaxes again quickly and he can feel her smile grow wider as she responds.

“Yeah,” she says breath warm against his neck. They’ve been doing this for a really long time and she’s a very smart girl. He knows that she realizes what he’s talking about and it both scares and excites him because as loud as the voice telling him he’s worthless is, the voice that wants this more than anything has been wearing him down since they left that tent earlier. And it gives him the strength to keep going, to not be a coward, to love her more.

“In the winter though, yeah?” And he thinks that he stuttered through part of it, but his heart’s pounding so hard that he’s proud that he even got it out at all. “It’ll be nice and cold. And I kn-know that all the dresses now don’t have sleeves b-but I figure that if anyone can find a coat for the occasion, you can.”

He definitely stuttered through that one. But he’s so far gone by now that he doesn’t really care. Especially when she stops dead in her tracks and pulls away from him to gaze up into his face imploringly, as if his mention of fashion has made all of this actually real. She seems to find what she’s looking for, as within a few seconds her smile’s widening and her eyes are welling up for the fiftieth time that day and she’s nodding and whispering “Yeah, I think I can find a coat.”

She’s barely finished the sentence before she’s throwing herself into his arms and kissing him. The music is swelling and people are staring and it’s all a bit like a cheesy rom-com. But he can’t really bring himself to care at the moment because there’s a tingling feeling building up in his chest that he thinks is the beginning of happiness and the new, Tony inspired voice in the back of his head really likes this turn of events. And he thinks…he thinks he can do this.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! You can come flail with me at captain--sunshine.tumblr.com


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